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A Night at the Junction
One cold winter's night Rosie was delivering coal to all the stations. The stations needed coal in order to keep the passengers warm while waiting for their trains in the waiting room. Rosie puffed into Wellsworth station, Stanley was there too, picking up passengers. "Hello Stanley. What are you doing?" "I'm picking up passengers to take to Knapford station. What are you doing?" "Delivering coal to all the stations. It's an easy job." "It might be easy Rosie, but even an easy job can be difficult." The stationmaster had finished unloading a couple of the boxcars that were filled with sacks of coal. The guard blew his whistle. And Rosie chuffed off to Maron station. When she arrived Percy was there delivering the mail. Rosie stopped at the platform, and while more of the boxcars were unloaded, the guard walked up to the cab to speak with Rosie's driver. "We are running ten minutes late. Knapford has lots of coal, we can go on to Crosby station." "We'll go as fast as we can." The guard walked back to the brakevan, blew his whistle and Rosie chuffed away. Rosie was flying along the line, she was soon at Knapford Junction, but all of a sudden, Rosie and her driver noticed that they were going into the siding. Rosie's driver applied the brakes. Rosie stopped, but as she slowed down, she was already in the siding. The signalman had switched the points, but it only made things worse. The first two boxcars of Rosie's train had derailed and blocked the line. Luckily no one was hurt, but soon Rosie heard a whistle. "Peep!Peep!" It was Stanley with his passenger train. She blew her whistle in an alarming way. Stanley's driver applied his brakes and Stanley stopped inches from the derailed boxcars. "Thank you Rosie." "Your welcome." "But now we need to warn Percy." So Stanley blew his whistle to warn Percy of the derailed boxcars. Percy's driver applied his brakes and Percy stopped on the track next to Stanley's track, and had almost ran into the derailed cars. "Thank you Stanley." The signalman saw the two engines and saw the derailed cars. He called for help at once. "Harvey will come in the morning to put your cars back onto the rails. As for you two, Stanley and Percy, you will both have to reverse back down the line and go a different way to your destinations." So Percy and Stanley took different routes in order to get to their destinations on time. As for Rosie, all she could do was sleep in the siding. That morning, Harvey arrived to put the derailed boxcars back onto the rails. The Fat Controller arrived as well to find out how the accident had happened. "I switched the points as Rosie puffed into the siding Sir. That's why the first two boxcars derailed." "You should of payed better attention to what you are doing." "Yes Sir." Rosie thought she would be in trouble for being late, but the Fat Controller spoke to her kindly. "You tried to make up for lost time. This accident wasn't your fault either." "Thank you SIr." Once Harvey had finished lifting the derailed cars back onto the line, Rosie coupled up to her train and puffed away to finish her job.